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A New Idea to Prevent / Punish Deadbeats (1 Viewer)

LawFitz

LawFitz

Footballguy
We have a couple notorious deadbeat owners in my one long-time league. Not deadbeat in terms of entry fee payment, but in terms of team management. Year after year, these two either compete early or pack it in for the season by about the end of the first quarter. From that point on, they become easy wins for the rest of the league, often impacting the playoff race.

This year one of these guys is 0-11 and hasn't bothered to adjust his lineup all through the bye weeks. Several victories were missed simply because he didn't start bench players. Effing sux.

So here's my idea. Instead of charging a fixed entry fee, why not make it variable, based on # of losses? Let's say the entry fee is 50 units with ten owners for a total of 500 units. If we instead made it 10 units per loss (there are 70 total losses in a season), that would give us 700 units, which means a 200 unit cushion in case someone decides not to pay due to heavy losses. It directly detracts owners from going home in week 4. And it rewards something crazy on the opposite side, like 14-0 or 13-1 before the playoffs even begin.

Everyone in this league can afford to pay the extra units if they happen to suck. We haven't changed the entry fee in something like 8 years and we are all older and more accomplished now, so this wouldn't cause someone to drop out because of affordability.

I think it's "genuis." And I'd love to hear your thoughts/comments before I propose this to my league.

 
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Would you pay for your losses at the end of the regular season? If so, any worries about collecting payments? What about doing something like everyone pays upfront for the maximum losses (14?) and pay the winners each week? More of an incentive to win instead of not lose, if that makes sense.

 
Almost as good as my idea of doing a live punt, pass, and kick competition with league members to get a extra points based on how you do - adding an element of skill to FF and taking out some of the luck. Chris Cooley 3 playoff TD's for an opponent will do that to you.

 
Amused to Death said:
Would you pay for your losses at the end of the regular season? If so, any worries about collecting payments? What about doing something like everyone pays upfront for the maximum losses (14?) and pay the winners each week? More of an incentive to win instead of not lose, if that makes sense.
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Only b/c we've all known each other for over a decade, collecting at the end of the year would be fine. But I could see collecting somewhere between 7-14 losses each upfront in a less dependable situation.

 
Better idea might be to charge everyone an extra 50% up front, and then refund the extra amount back at the end of the year on some kind of variable scale.

 
The only way is peer pressure. What if they dont care about the money? Kick them out and replace them if they dont straighten up.

 
ratbast said:
The only way is peer pressure. What if they dont care about the money? Kick them out and replace them if they dont straighten up.
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This.

I understand, not everyone is as passionate about fantasy football as I am. But, come on, set a lineup each week. Set aside 10 minutes to add and drop players. If this is too much to ask, then maybe that guy would be happier doing something else on Sundays.

 
good ol' fashioned ridicule is not a bad tool

 
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Our league has done this for a while. 5 bucks for greater then 20 point losses. Also 10 dollar fine for starting out players. (or no player at all) Hurts bad teams though. Also collect an amount greater then entry fee.

 
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Same issue in my league. My best friend is the easy victory, though he's actually WON a couple times simply because he has the Stafford/Mega combo and others have had uncharacteristically bad weeks.

Solution is not to invite him back next year. Will he really complain when it's obvious he's not that into it anyway?

 
Great if you're in a friends league. I don't imagine many strangers will 1) pay extra 2)if using LeagueSafe (like I do for all leagues) how that'd work out

I always just designate the 4th and final playoff spot to highest team total points (outside top 3 records) and have each team play one another one time. Another alternative is Victory Points standings.

 
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PatsWillWin said:
Better idea might be to charge everyone an extra 50% up front, and then refund the extra amount back at the end of the year on some kind of variable scale.
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Yes. Having losers pay more is exactly the same, mathematically, as having everyone pay more and then giving extra prizes to the winners. So instead of phrasing it as "losers pay an extra $10 per loss," I would phrase it as "everyone pays an extra $10 per game, and you get $20 back for each win." That way you can collect at the beginning of the season instead of at the end, because you don't have to know how many games each person will lose before collecting.

 
LawFitz said:
We have a couple notorious deadbeat owners in my one long-time league. Not deadbeat in terms of entry fee payment, but in terms of team management. Year after year, these two either compete early or pack it in for the season by about the end of the first quarter. From that point on, they become easy wins for the rest of the league, often impacting the playoff race.

This year one of these guys is 0-11 and hasn't bothered to adjust his lineup all through the bye weeks. Several victories were missed simply because he didn't start bench players. Effing sux.

So here's my idea. Instead of charging a fixed entry fee, why not make it variable, based on # of losses? Let's say the entry fee is 50 units with ten owners for a total of 500 units. If we instead made it 10 units per loss (there are 70 total losses in a season), that would give us 700 units, which means a 200 unit cushion in case someone decides not to pay due to heavy losses. It directly detracts owners from going home in week 4. And it rewards something crazy on the opposite side, like 14-0 or 13-1 before the playoffs even begin.

Everyone in this league can afford to pay the extra units if they happen to suck. We haven't changed the entry fee in something like 8 years and we are all older and more accomplished now, so this wouldn't cause someone to drop out because of affordability.

I think it's "genuis." And I'd love to hear your thoughts/comments before I propose this to my league.
Click to expand...
In my experience, no league bylaws or fee structure (however ingeniously engineered) can compensate for having owners who are just not "into it". I fought this sort of fight in my long standing league with real life friends/family/neighbours for a number of years with all manner of tail twisting but it wasn't until we parted ways with a couple of people and replaced them with ones who were more engaged, that the problem magically went away.

 
ratbast said:
The only way is peer pressure. What if they dont care about the money? Kick them out and replace them if they dont straighten up.
Click to expand...
Additionally, this is always a great idea. If you have a plaque with all the former champions on it and they were once champ (which I doubt since they sound like LOSERS) , remove their name, snap a picture of it and e-mail it to them.

Rove! said:
good ol' fashioned ridicule is not a bad tool
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Tell them thanks for the EASY $.

 
boot them. We have a guy in our league who is 2-9 and has packed it in. Completely un-competitive for anyone who plays him now (and I need these guys to lose so I can sneak in the playoffs).

I know the feeling. Im going to try to convince the commish to let him go after the season (he is a co-worker though)

 
ratbast said:
The only way is peer pressure. What if they dont care about the money? Kick them out and replace them if they dont straighten up.
Click to expand...
This.

I would not have had them back after the first season. As soon as you simply choose not to update your roster for multiple weeks in a season, the door can hit you in the ### on the way out.

 
LawFitz said:
A New Idea to Prevent / Punish Deadbeats
Click to expand...
This idea is good, but it isn't so new. Our primary money league has been doing a version of this since the early 90's.

It does not need to be designed as punitive (punish deadbeats) however. It can simply be a method to provide incentive for owners to stay engaged all the way through the season regardless of record or playoff hopes.

We have always structured our $'s so that every game has a fianancial outcome associated with it. A head to head win nets you $x out of the prize pool. A head to head loss requires you to pay $2x into the prize pool. Using this method, these payouts are self-funding and actually act to build the prize pool throughout the year.

You can set the value of x in a way that makes sense for your league. We are currently at an x amount of 2% of the entry fee. I'd recommended the % be a little higher for low entry fee leagues, but thats up to the individual league.

Whether you have everyone pay a higher amount at the outset of the season or simply true up at the end is a seperate issue, and has more to do with the types of owners you have. We've had no issues with simply truing up the numbers at the end of the season. Teams with large winning %'s have credit balances and teams that bomb owe a pretty decent chunk of change.

If you have a bunch of doorknobs in your league, then you'd likely want to have everyone pay 125% of your entry fee at the outset and just credit those guys who earn the W's $ back.

This has been very effective in keeping owners actively managing their teams all the way to the end of the regular season.

 
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In our league we have two consolation brackets with prize money, and weekly high score prizes continue through the playoffs.

Regarding deadbeats, the first offense you are fined, the second offense you are removed from the league.

 
my first year this year as Commish.

What I did was charge an extra small sum as the entry fee that was set aside for weekly prizes for points winners. This way guys still have a reason to set their lineup each week as even if they are mathematically out of it they might still win that week.

SO far it has worked out.

Only 1 match this year was one due to someone not setting lineup. And he admitted it was user Error. He stated he set it and thought it updated automatically. Must not have hit submit.

He has since not done same thing.

 
LawFitz said:
We have a couple notorious deadbeat owners in my one long-time league. Not deadbeat in terms of entry fee payment, but in terms of team management. Year after year, these two either compete early or pack it in for the season by about the end of the first quarter. From that point on, they become easy wins for the rest of the league, often impacting the playoff race.

This year one of these guys is 0-11 and hasn't bothered to adjust his lineup all through the bye weeks. Several victories were missed simply because he didn't start bench players. Effing sux.

So here's my idea. Instead of charging a fixed entry fee, why not make it variable, based on # of losses? Let's say the entry fee is 50 units with ten owners for a total of 500 units. If we instead made it 10 units per loss (there are 70 total losses in a season), that would give us 700 units, which means a 200 unit cushion in case someone decides not to pay due to heavy losses. It directly detracts owners from going home in week 4. And it rewards something crazy on the opposite side, like 14-0 or 13-1 before the playoffs even begin.

Everyone in this league can afford to pay the extra units if they happen to suck. We haven't changed the entry fee in something like 8 years and we are all older and more accomplished now, so this wouldn't cause someone to drop out because of affordability.

I think it's "genuis." And I'd love to hear your thoughts/comments before I propose this to my league.
Click to expand...
The bolded part makes this a horrible idea.

 
Amused to Death said:
Would you pay for your losses at the end of the regular season? If so, any worries about collecting payments? What about doing something like everyone pays upfront for the maximum losses (14?) and pay the winners each week? More of an incentive to win instead of not lose, if that makes sense.
Click to expand...
this. :yes:

 
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Pay up front. In you case 700 units = 700/10 = everyone pays 70 units up front. Then at the end of the season settle up all resultant debits/credits.

 
We'd run him out of the league. Our league is too good for deadbeats. Done it 3X already. Love you bro, you're a great friend, but if you can't participate enough to be competitive you're out.

 
Judge Smails said:
We'd run him out of the league. Our league is too good for deadbeats. Done it 3X already. Love you bro, you're a great friend, but if you can't participate enough to be competitive you're out.
Click to expand...
This is the correct answer. Why punish people, then keep them in your league to punish them again? Boot them if they suck.

Or another idea is to have a "Ricin Roulette". Idea: The four worst team owners of that year are forced to drink a cocktail. once of which is laced with ricin. The laced drink will be randomly determined (or you could do a lottery concept). This is done at a yearly draft, with a new owner there, waiting to take over the soon to be deceased owner's team. Good for the new owner to see what happens if they suck too.

 
To combat this problem in our league, our commissioner tried a different approach. We raised the buy-in and have weekly prizes for most points at a certain position and highest-scoring team each week. There's still the playoff pot, but now owners have an incentive to fight for weekly prizes even if they're mathematically out of the playoffs beside pride I guess. I like it, but I would've fought week in and week out for pride's sake.

 
Love the responses. All very helpful stuff. Ricin Roulette is my favorite.

How about a simplified version of the original idea... Keep existing entry fee in place, collected at season start and paid at season end as we do now; then

add a 10 unit bonus for wins above 7 and a 10 unit penalty for losses above 7, to be collected and paid out at year end. Collectively, these bonuses and penalties should offset each other. If someone doesn't pay, boot him and tax his penalty amount equally from bonus winners.

 
LawFitz said:
Love the responses. All very helpful stuff. Ricin Roulette is my favorite.

How about a simplified version of the original idea... Keep existing entry fee in place, collected at season start and paid at season end as we do now; then

add a 10 unit bonus for wins above 7 and a 10 unit penalty for losses above 7, to be collected and paid out at year end. Collectively, these bonuses and penalties should offset each other. If someone doesn't pay, boot him and tax his penalty amount equally from bonus winners.
Click to expand...
If you have a live draft, have the losers pay the bar tab next year.

 
Kick them out of your league if they aren't into it instead of devising some scheme to keep them involved.

 
In our league we give a warning on first offense. (sometimes people make mistakes) Second offense will cause your 1st round draft pick is moved back 3 spots. Third offense they are removed from the league.

The rules clearly define what is considered a tanking offense. Since it is a salary league, we only have waivers once a week. So, a last minute injury can pop up.

Even so, if an owner wants to tank, punishment doesn't always work. You have to take away the thing they are trying to get. A better draft position. If that doesn't motivate them, then they need to be removed from the league

 
habsfan said:
LawFitz said:
We have a couple notorious deadbeat owners in my one long-time league. Not deadbeat in terms of entry fee payment, but in terms of team management. Year after year, these two either compete early or pack it in for the season by about the end of the first quarter. From that point on, they become easy wins for the rest of the league, often impacting the playoff race.

This year one of these guys is 0-11 and hasn't bothered to adjust his lineup all through the bye weeks. Several victories were missed simply because he didn't start bench players. Effing sux.

So here's my idea. Instead of charging a fixed entry fee, why not make it variable, based on # of losses? Let's say the entry fee is 50 units with ten owners for a total of 500 units. If we instead made it 10 units per loss (there are 70 total losses in a season), that would give us 700 units, which means a 200 unit cushion in case someone decides not to pay due to heavy losses. It directly detracts owners from going home in week 4. And it rewards something crazy on the opposite side, like 14-0 or 13-1 before the playoffs even begin.

Everyone in this league can afford to pay the extra units if they happen to suck. We haven't changed the entry fee in something like 8 years and we are all older and more accomplished now, so this wouldn't cause someone to drop out because of affordability.

I think it's "genuis." And I'd love to hear your thoughts/comments before I propose this to my league.
Click to expand...
In my experience, no league bylaws or fee structure (however ingeniously engineered) can compensate for having owners who are just not "into it". I fought this sort of fight in my long standing league with real life friends/family/neighbours for a number of years with all manner of tail twisting but it wasn't until we parted ways with a couple of people and replaced them with ones who were more engaged, that the problem magically went away.
Click to expand...
Maybe if you change it from monetary to physical it will improve. You lose a finger every time you do not field a complete and active roster.

:P

 
MoveToSkypager said:
Judge Smails said:
We'd run him out of the league. Our league is too good for deadbeats. Done it 3X already. Love you bro, you're a great friend, but if you can't participate enough to be competitive you're out.
Click to expand...
This is the correct answer. Why punish people, then keep them in your league to punish them again? Boot them if they suck.
Click to expand...
This is my recommendation as well. Any rule trying to deter deadbeat owners is like treating the symptom and not the cause.

It's simple really. Either an owner is committed for the entire season, or they're not. If they're not, get a new owner who is.

 
BaBastage said:
MoveToSkypager said:
Judge Smails said:
We'd run him out of the league. Our league is too good for deadbeats. Done it 3X already. Love you bro, you're a great friend, but if you can't participate enough to be competitive you're out.
Click to expand...
This is the correct answer. Why punish people, then keep them in your league to punish them again? Boot them if they suck.
Click to expand...
This is my recommendation as well. Any rule trying to deter deadbeat owners is like treating the symptom and not the cause.

It's simple really. Either an owner is committed for the entire season, or they're not. If they're not, get a new owner who is.
Click to expand...
It's not quite this simple when you're talking about guys who have been in your league since day one and it's in double digit years now.

 
LawFitz said:
BaBastage said:
MoveToSkypager said:
Judge Smails said:
We'd run him out of the league. Our league is too good for deadbeats. Done it 3X already. Love you bro, you're a great friend, but if you can't participate enough to be competitive you're out.
Click to expand...
This is the correct answer. Why punish people, then keep them in your league to punish them again? Boot them if they suck.
Click to expand...
This is my recommendation as well. Any rule trying to deter deadbeat owners is like treating the symptom and not the cause.It's simple really. Either an owner is committed for the entire season, or they're not. If they're not, get a new owner who is.
Click to expand...
It's not quite this simple when you're talking about guys who have been in your league since day one and it's in double digit years now.
Click to expand...
It just depends. If a guy has a lot going on his life you cut him some slack. Life comes first - we get it. But if it's pure apathy something has to be done. Maybe he needs an active co-owner to help him out. We've done that. But the bottom line deadbeat owners ruin leagues. In my work league a guy started 3 Patriots against me - when they were on a bye. Who wants that? We do fines to try and influence behavior, but if the guy just doesn't care anymore move on.
 
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